Col. Ashleigh B. Smythe, Ph.D. - 麻豆女演员 Institute

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Col. Ashleigh B. Smythe, Ph.D.

Col. Ashleigh B. Smythe, Ph.D.

Department Head of Biology

Office: 303E Maury-Brooke Hall

Phone: 540-464-7934

Email: smytheab@vmi.edu

Fields: Invertebrate Zoology & Parasitology

My research focuses on the evolution and ecology of invertebrate animals. While my primary research interest is in the evolution and diversity of free-living nematodes, students in my lab also research other invertebrates, especially parasites.

Free-living marine nematodes 鈥� 鈥疢arine sediments support by far the greatest diversity of nematode species, and I aim to understand their diversity, evolution, and taxonomy.

Parasite ecology and evolution 鈥� My students and I study a variety of parasitic worms.鈥� Examples include the diversity and distribution of leeches infecting turtles, the community of parasites in muskrats, and the attraction of a beetle host to a larval tapeworm.

Publications
  • Jones, Anne C., Mason C. Martin, Tappey H. Jones, Roger Ramirez-Barrios, and Ashleigh B. Smythe. 2025. Volatiles in feces of rats infected with the tapeworm听Hymenolepis diminuta. Journal of Parasitology听111(2):188-194.
  • Rawson, Christopher J., Nemmers, London,听Criswell, Stacey, Smythe, Ashleigh B., Burke, Alison K., Eugene Marais, Gillian Maggs-K枚lling, Treonis, Amy M. 2024.听Description of听Panagrolaimus namibiensis听sp. (Rhabditida: Panagrolaimidae), an anhydrobiotic nematode from the Namib Desert of Namibia. Journal of Nematology Vol. 56: e2024-1.
  • Mohammed Ahmed, Nickellaus G. Roberts, Funmilola Adedidran, Ashleigh B. Smythe, Kevin M. Kocot and Oleksandr Holovachov. 2022. Phylogenomic analysis of the phylum Nematoda: conflicts and congruences with morphology, 18S rRNA, and mitogenomes. Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, Vol. 9, January, 2022.
  • Ashleigh B. 听Smythe. 听2020. 听Nematoda and Pan-Nematoda. 听In: First Book of Phylogenetically Defined Names: A Companion to the PhyloCode. 听K. de Queiroz, P. Cantino, and J. Gauthier, eds. 听University of California Press.
  • Ashleigh B. Smythe, Oleksandr Holovachov, Kevin M. Kocot. 2019. 听Improved phylogenomic sampling of free-living nematodes enhances resolution of higher-level nematode phylogeny. BMC Evolutionary Biology 19:121.
  • Ashleigh B. Smythe. 听2015. 听Evolution of feeding structures in the marine nematode order Enoplida. 听Integrative and Comparative Biology 55(2): 228-240.
  • Soraya Naem and Ashleigh B. Smythe. 2015. Tegumental ultrastructure of adult Quinqueserialis quinquiserialis (Trematoda: Notocotylidae): an intestinal parasite of muskrat (Ondatra zibethicus). Parasitology Research 114 (7): 2473-2480.
  • Ashleigh B. Smythe, Kristin Forgrave*, Amanda Patti*, Rick Hochberg, and Marian Litvaitis. 2015. Untangling the ecology, taxonomy, and evolution of Chaetogaster limnaei (Oligochaeta: Naididae) species complex. Journal of Parasitology 101(3) p. 320-326. (*Undergraduate co-author)
  • Inga A. Zasada, Amy Peetz, Dana K. Howe, Larry J. Wilhelm, Daravuth Cheam, Dee R. Denver, Ashleigh B. Smythe. 听2014. 听Using mitogenomic and nuclear ribosomal sequence data to investigate the phylogeny of virus-vectoring Xiphinema americanum-group nematodes. PLoS One Vol. 9 (2).
  • Ashleigh B. Smythe, Michael J. Sanderson, and Steven A. Nadler. 2006. Nematode small subunit phylogeny correlates with alignment parameters. Systematic Biology 55(6): 972-992.
  • Ashleigh B. Smythe and Steven A. Nadler. 2006. Molecular phylogeny of Acrobeloides and Cephalobus (Nematoda, Cephalobina) reveals paraphyletic taxa and recurrent evolution of simple labial morphology. Nematology 8(6): 819-836.
  • B. Smythe and W.F. Font. 2001. Phylogenetic analysis of Alloglossidium (Digenea: Macroderoididae) and related genera: Life-cycle evolution and taxonomic revision. Journal of Parasitology 87 (2): 386-391.